


Little Dawn

by idiopathicsmile



Series: Keep it Steady [4]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:47:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25714519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idiopathicsmile/pseuds/idiopathicsmile
Summary: It's like there are two Grantaires. (A World Ain't Ready alternate POV scene.)
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables)
Series: Keep it Steady [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1865029
Comments: 25
Kudos: 532





	Little Dawn

**Author's Note:**

> (This is for everyone who read World Ain't Ready and wanted to know what The Song was. On one hand, I really do think that the track Grantaire plays in his van should be whatever has the most meaning for you, personally. On the other hand, multiple people have been curious what The Song was in my mind, so I figured I'd write up my version of events and you can feel free to take it with a huge grain of salt. This is set right after the van scene. Also, this is perilously close to being songfic. You have been warned.)

Enjolras runs to his room, and then wastes several seconds just standing there in front of his desk, surrounded by all of his familiar things, reeling from unfamiliar thoughts. He stood in the exact same place this morning, the exact same view, and he didn’t even know yet what Grantaire sounded like, belting out a rock chorus with pure conviction, each word known, each word so clearly beloved.

He swallows, boots up his computer, which is surely working much more slowly than usual. When it finally loads, he navigates to Google, and types in every lyric from the song he can remember.

A title appears. The song Grantaire said _you need to hear_ is “Shake the Sheets”, by a band called Ted Leo and the Pharmacists. The album is also called _Shake the Sheets_ , and Enjolras would find this all uncomfortably sexual except he knows it’s not about that at all, it’s about waking up and seeing what’s in front of you, and realizing what has to be done.

Enjolras scribbles a note in case his dad comes home early, finds his bike, clips on his helmet. It’s a fifteen-minute ride to Borders, and on the way, Enjolras promises himself he’ll atone for putting money in the pockets of an evil corporation, he’ll buy two albums from that indie record store out in Ann Arbor, but that’s way too far to bike, and he needs answers right now.

It’s like there are two Grantaires. 

There’s the Grantaire who doesn’t care about anything, who thinks caring is a fucking joke, and then there’s the Grantaire who does things like cover Jehan’s shoes with flowers, and put real work into making Enjolras smile, and lovingly memorize the lyrics to a song that’s basically about revolution.

_I think there’s a song you need to hear._

Wake up, Enjolras. What have you been missing?

There are two Grantaires. There’s the Grantaire that’s an act, and then there’s the real person, under all those layers of posturing, and more and more—it sounds completely far-fetched, Enjolras knows, it sounds like every kind of wishful thinking piled on itself, his own worst tendencies to see what he wants to see—more and more, it’s starting to seem like the actual genuine Grantaire is, well. Genuine. A little anxious. Surprisingly kind.

It turns out you can get to Borders in about ten minutes if you don’t pace yourself, if you pedal full-force up every incline and then keep pushing downhill. Enjolras wipes sweat from his forehead as he rifles through the T section of Rock/Alternative. He didn’t even bother to take off his helmet.

_Shake the Sheets_ is exactly where it’s supposed to be. The colors are weirdly bold, like socialist propaganda. Like a flag.

The cashier is talking to a co-worker as she rings him up, like it’s just any other regular CD. Enjolras doesn’t pay attention to how much it costs, just hands her a twenty and takes the change she gives him. 

The ride back home is, if anything, faster.

Enjolras rips off the cellophane, then opens the CD case with maybe a little reverence and pops the disc into his computer. He’s already vowed he won’t skip straight to the one song he knows, much as he wants to relive that exact moment, a flash of delighted eye contact, Grantaire air-drumming against the steering wheel of a parked van in the middle of suburbia. He wants to show proper respect for the album, and besides, maybe jumping right back to “Shake the Sheets” is a little creepy?

The music is not bad, but waiting for track nine to come up again is torture, until about halfway through, when Ted Leo sings, “So take a sigh as long as the war's been going on in your heart tonight.” 

Enjolras sits up straight and fumbles for the booklet with the lyrics.

There’s a driving urgency to the song, a sense that Ted Leo knows exactly what he’s talking about. Enjolras reads ahead, and then waits with breathless anticipation for the chorus:

_“But on the days and nights it's hard to breathe_  
_And you can't believe you still walk the streets_  
_Stretch out your weary hand to me, it's alright_  
_And if you're not content to just believe_  
_And if you don't consent to just let it be_  
_Stretch out your legs and dance with me all night”_

He’d had no idea rock music could _be_ like this, could reach right inside your heart and grab at precisely the thing you’ve been wanting, the longing you didn’t even know how to put into words. That’s what he wants, for someone to stand with him and reach out a hand, even if just to say, I see where you are and I’m here.

And in a way, isn’t that what Grantaire did this afternoon? Isn’t that what he’s been doing for weeks, even months? Grantaire learned that song on his own time. Nobody backed him into it, he played that track over and over again because he loves it. He loves it and he’d wanted Enjolras to have it, too. 

The song they sang together, this whole album, it’s about doing. Not thinking yourself in circles, not paralyzing yourself with fear or worry or indecision. Boots on the ground. Time to go.

Enjolras is going to do it. He’s going to ask out Grantaire. Maybe he’s wrong, maybe the Grantaire he’s come to see and know and really, really, _really_ like is the charade. But after today, he really doesn’t think so.

“It’s alright it’s alright it’s alright it’s alright,” Ted Leo chants under a guitar riff, and Enjolras opens up a new word doc, so he can make some notes on what exactly he’ll say tomorrow. The words will matter, he thinks. He’s been too judgmental, too hasty, in the past. He needs to get this right, to say the right thing that will let Grantaire know exactly what Enjolras means.

(And what if he does? What if he gets it right, and Grantaire smiles back at him, maybe a little shy but already cracking a smile the way he does sometimes--)

When the track runs out, he starts it again. He’s already humming along.


End file.
